FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a device which provides mine sweeping operations for detecting mines having ignition system sensitive to the magnetic fields.
Sweep devices, in the form of towed live electrodes or cable loops of the double-wire circuit are used for remote sweeping of mines located beneath the surface of the sea.
The power supply for the sweep devices is by means of generators on board manned sweeper crafts connected to towed cables.
These crafts, which normally operate in formation, are used for sweeping magnetic and/or acoustic mines as described in German Patent Application DE-PS No. 20 14 623. The field winding of the generator is controlled by an electric signal transmitter for presetting a sweep program in the form of different types of signals via a servo component.
In one variation, rods are housed in mobile, directionable floats in which the sweep current generators are also located.
In this connection reference is made to the German Patent Application DE-PS No. 978 056 according to which the sweeper is in the form of a cylindrical pressure hull capable of floating which is encircled by windings having current passing therethrough. The pressure hull accommodates the power propulsion generator, the magnetic field and the sound waves.
One or more of these floats are remotely controlled by a manned mother-ship.
Each of these prior art devices produce the magnetic sweep field electromagnetically and in the case of high sweep performances there is a considerable consumption of power which greatly reduces the utilization time and consequently prevents a fast sweep of large areas. Furthermore, it is common to these devices that the far zone and, to a certain extent, the near zone can be considered as homogeneous at short distances. Thus these devices cannot be used to sweep mines with magnetic differential field or gradient ignition systems or else they would be destroyed if the mine in the near zone receives sufficiently high gradients as in the arrangement utilizing magnetizable rods.